Hunting

Fall

Our fall hunts for Moose, Mule Deer, Black Bear and Wolf are conducted by 4 wheel drive, horseback, foot or boat. We have twenty head of well trained pack horses which we use on some hunts. To access a portion of my area, I use the services of an old gold rush town which includes lodging and meals for my one early hunt. We prefer parties of no more than four sportsmen in camp at any time. This enables us to devote more personal time to our clients and harvest the animals desired. I personally guide on all hunts. We cater to hunters from every ability level. All my guides are experienced in my area.

All meat is packed out. There is a local meat locker and custom meat-cutting service in Quesnel where you can have your game meat cut, wrapped and frozen to your specifications. The cost is reasonable but is not included in the price of the hunt. Taxidermy work is also your responsibility. Field preparation (capping, salting, etc) is done by myself or my guides and is included in the price of the hunt. Hunting time will be temporarily held until your trophy and meat is prepared for the meat locker and prepared for transfer to a taxidermist of your choice.

Spring

Our spring hunts for Grizzly Bear, Black Bear, and Wolf  are made along the Swift River, Quesnel River, Cariboo Mountain, Porter Creek, and Cariboo River and are conducted in the same manner as my fall hunts.

Once desired game is harvested, you may enjoy fishing at remote lakes near camp within walking or riding distance, provided you have purchased an angling license. There is also an abundant supply of Ruffed Grouse and a few Blue Grouse.

It is up to the guide to determine if the animal was hit enough to be fatal. Every effort must be made to find the animal. It is the hunter's choice to continue the search until the end of the hunt. If the animal is not found it is considered taken and the hunt for that species is finished. If the hunter has other tags he may continue for other species. No refunds will be given upon withdrawl from any hunt in process.

Success

We run a low volume of hunters which has kept our success rate up for 2009 season. We accommodated 12 combo hunters. We never book more than our quota allows. Most of our clients are repeat customers or referrals.

 December 2008
HOWDY HUNTER,

 

Hello from our Outfit to yours!

Another year has come and gone. This year was one of our slower years.

Our spring Bear hunts went well considering the deep snow conditions

we had to deal with. May 20th some of the roads to access the Grizzly country still had over 2 feet of packed snow, causing us to hunt lower elevations.

I had another outfitter take one of his clients in my area for Black Bear, Rudy and Ann Martinak from Sumner, Wa. from May 8-17th who bagged 2 male Black Bears, both record book Bears, 18 14/16, and 18 1/16. I took Mike Campbell from Nashville on a Grizzly hunt from May 20-31st who took the 7th Grizzly we saw. It was not a huge bear, 8 years old when inspected, also took a nice Black Bear scoring 19 8/16 and let a nice Brown Black Bear grow up for another year.

Summer brought us to some fishing trips with the River Boat on the Quesnel and Cariboo Rivers.

Our fall started out not to great with a couple of cancellations, our September 20-27th hunt we had no clients. So Josh, my guide and I decided we would go get ourselves a moose for a change since we very seldom get a chance to hunt. We headed to the north part of my area to hunt a river. The first hour Josh got a nice 47”, who ran into a pond making packing out challenging which took up the rest of the day taking care of it. You can view this Moose on our website. The next day we started out on the river and had to stop due to heavy fog, when it lifted continued down to a spot and stopped to call. After the first call I had an answer bringing out a 35” bull, coming within 80 yards. This took the rest of the day packing him out and taking care of it.

The next hunt October 2-9th Sam Kothe Ridgefield, Wa and Hank Seth from Deer Island joined us on a hunt. Sam took a Moose on the 3rd day. Hank had some haywire ammunition and did not get his Moose. Hank has come with us several years, and the first time he had gone home without his Moose.

October 14th-21 we took Steve Lucas from Corvallis, Wa and Frank Hayes from Chiffon, Ariz. Steve bagged his first Moose on the second day, Frank tried to get his with a bow, but was unable to get within range.

November 7-16th Joseph Mismas from from Snohomish, Wa. joined us on a Moose and Mule Deer hunt, bagging his first moose on the 7th day. He passed on a smaller Mule Deer, never seeing the trophy he wanted.

November 19-30th We took Brian Bassett from Veroina, Or. John Lottis from Keizer, Or. , Murry Leslie from, Doug Hoselton and Debbie Sofin from Corvallis, Or. all joined us on a trophy Mule Deer hunt. The weather turned against us with strong winds, noisy hunting conditions. The Deer were moving at night and holding up during the day. The wolves moved in and animals were very spooky, some smaller bucks were seen but no trophy bucks were taken unfortunately.

I would like to thank all my clients who booked with us this year, and in the past.

Also a thank-you to my guides Josh Mackenzie, Darrel Collins and Scott Pichette for another year of safe hunting.

We will be attending the Washington Sportsman show in Puyallup on January 21st-25th, Eugene Show on February 2-4th and the Pacific Northwest Sports Show in Portland on February 4th-8th, 2009.

We wish you and your family a safe ‘Happy Holiday Season‘, All the best in 2009!!!

Good Hunting ,
Brad and Lori Bowden


2009 SEASON NEWSLETTER

Greetings Friends,


With the snow falling, and the temperatures dropping in the Quesnel highlands, the cabins are all buttoned up and we have concluded another year. A year full of success and adventure here at Cariboo Mountain Outfitters. This year brought excitement from returning friends as well as the arrival of some new ones. The starting point of 2009 was an exciting one. With returning friends Doug and Mona Hoselton from Corvallis Oregon first out of the gate. The mission at hand was trophy spring Black Bear. The hunt started off well, with every day becoming more exciting as the bears were waking up almost by the hour from their long winters sleep. The third day of the eight day adventure proved to be nothing less than awesome! It was around 2 pm when we had got into an area that was littered with fresh bear sign. With our spirits high we continued our search for the perfect bear. That’s when it happened! Right to our left a ruckus caught our eyes, about 60 yards away there were two beautiful boars in the middle of a royal rumble. We piled out of the tracker and began to set up, neither bear paying attention to anything other than whopping the other bears butt. The two giants rolled around like two fat kids in a play ground tumbling around snapping and growling. Poor Doug with trusty greeny (his 30-06) waving around trying to lock on the larger of the two bears. We stalked the bears from a distance of around 70 yards as they tumbled down the grassy logging road, until they rolled into the larger timber. We stood on the road and watched the small bushes shake violently as the heavy weights continued their battle just out of view. After a brief safety meeting we decided to slowly creep in the timber after the bears, Doug armed with greeny, Brad armed with shooting sticks and myself armed with a very powerful top of the line Sony video camera. We made it roughly 60 yards in the timer when all hell broke loose, with the two boars in front of us still. A sudden bawl of a cub broke the silence of the bush from behind us followed by the woofing and jaw snapping of the sow. Although this was a little concerning our focus was still on the boars that were now looking in our direction through the thick brush. We could see one of the boars below a large pine tree. He was trying to figure out who or what was behind him, he was woofing, snarling, growling, and snapping his teeth trying to intimidate whatever was behind him (which was us) into moving so he could see where they were. All this was happening and Doug was patiently waiting for his shot. Suddenly in his attempt to intimidate us the bear stood up clawing the pine tree he was standing beneath, that’s all Doug needed, he pulled up and the shot rang out. The shiny coated beast piled up only 15 feet from where Doug shot him. After some high fives and some congratulating Brad headed back to the rig where Mona was sitting patiently taking pictures of the sow and her three little cubs as they ate grass along the road. What a way to start the year! We hunted hard the next five days with the opportunity for several large bears for Mona to harvest, but with one case of haywire ammo and a few cases of bad luck we couldn’t get Mona a the bear we had hoped for. Hopefully this will mean we can have her join us for another attempt. The next three hunts proved to be equally as successful as Doug’s, as new friends Bob and Deb Winn joined us from Oregon as well. Bob was the rifle and Deb was along for the holiday. Bob tagged out with a nice black bear right away. And the third hunt we had new friends Mike and Rubye Sytsma who tagged the largest bear of the season at just over 7’. We think this was the bear that was fighting with Doug’s bear as it was harvested in the same area.


The summer activities around the lodge where a little quieter than we would of liked, with only one jet boat/fishing trip. Some of Lori’s family members joined us on a trip on the extremely scenic Cariboo River. Fishing was a little slow this day but the weather and spectacular mountain views made it very fun. We also did a day trip with 12 of our friends down the swift river this was an absolute blast. With good weather, good company and a pot luck dinner to cap off the fantastic day. We have added a new river to our already impressive arsenal. The Bowron River is a great fishery filled with native Kokanee, Rainbow trout, Bull trout (Dolly Varden), and the odd Rocky Mountain Whitefish. The fish in this river are big and scrappy taking to both fly as well as gear fishing techniques. It is a no motor river and we are basically the exclusive guide service to this river. So if you’re looking for a little different experience don’t forget our summer fishing and sightseeing adventures that we can customize for your maximum enjoyment!Although there was a bit of a catch 22 with our moose hunting this year it was still a very rewarding season for our lodge. Although our success rate was down slightly from our past five seasons, the quality of the moose taken was higher. This season started with returning colleague Mike Cambell and new friend Charles Bellefant from Nashville Tennessee, both in search of trophy moose. We conducted this adventure out of the eastern side of our area, behind the ghost town of Barkerville and on the south border of the infamous Bowron Lakes provincial park. We were hunting the Cariboo River using the jet boat as well as a smaller raft. Brad would drop Charles and me off at the top of Kimbell Lake with the small raft, and then he and Mike would head approx 20 miles downriver and we would hunt towards each other throughout the day. The unbelievably warm temperatures (33 degrees Celsius) made hunting tough. We did some fishing, seen plenty of grizzly bears, and eight Bull Moose throughout the eight days hunting, including one on the last morning. But none of the bulls seen were worthy of either hunter pulling the trigger. Although it was a most memorable hunt, we did not successfully harvest the large bull either hunter desired. Hopefully our friends will return and we can try again in 2010.Our next hunt brought returning comrade Murry Leslie with a new friend and Murry’s nephew Mike Bassett, as well as returning client from 27 years ago Larry Wisman. The hunt started off well with Murry (78 years young) harvesting a nice bull the first afternoon. This moose was especially awesome because Murry used his 1949 30-06 with peep sights, to shoot the moose at around 110 yards, now that’s cool in my opinion. The next morning a wolf presented himself for Mike to harvest, but due to a safety malfunction on his 300, the old boy lives on. The next two days went well with a number of cow moose viewed. It was the fourth day that things picked up, a double header. Larry and I headed to an area where we had spotted several cows the previous days, Brad, Mike and Murry headed to another honey hole. As Larry and I made our way from the old logging road down to the edge of Smitty Lake (I must have chose the worst route to the shore! So thick.) We could hear the excited grunts of a bull somewhere in front of us. We eased our way to the lake shore and realized that the bull was on the other side of the lake in the timber. The outer perimeter of this lake is very marshy so if we could get the bull to the edge of the lake there would be a possible shot. We stood back in the willows out of view and I squawked a cow call, trying to sound as amorous as I could. Instantly the bull answered with two quick grunts. We stood in the willows waiting, with me squawking cow calls every so often and him trying to lure the cow he hears out of the willows. 45 min went by but it felt like an eternity. Larry turns to me and asks me “Do you think he will come out?” I replied as if I knew for sure “Ya he will come out, he’s just doing the same thing we are, standing in the timber trying to see where we are.” I spoke it with confidence but the reality is I didn’t have a clue if it would come out, I was just being optimistic! I no sooner stated this and by sure stroke of luck the beautiful bull skirted just inside the tree line and came straight to the water’s edge to drink. Staring in our direction between gulps 400 yards away. At first it seemed the bull was going to swim the lake and pop out 40 yards in front of us, but he turned and started to head back into the timber, I cow called and the big fellow turned, looked over his shoulder and started to make his way around the lake to where we were. We knew we had to be quick because if he made it too far around the end of the lake he would get our wind, and there was a finger of evergreen trees that would block our view. We had to make it to that finger of trees. So the race was on, the big bull going down one side of the lake and us crouched in the willows heading down the other. We made it to the trees and I took out my Leatherman tool to cut some branches off a tree for Larry to have a good rest. The bull stopped, BOOM!! Larry made a perfect lung shot at 367 yards. What a hunt! We took pictures, dressed the bull and headed back to the lodge to grab the ATV to get the meat out. We were just in time. Upon heading back to camp with Larry’s moose we met Lori at Hangman Hill on her daily walk. She had informed us that Mike had also harvested a bull and that they too had shown up looking for the already claimed ATV. 15 more minutes and Larry and I would have been stuck carrying our moose instead of Mike and Brad packing theirs, ha ha that’s hunting!



Larry’s first look at his Smitty Lake bull! Murry, Brad, and Mike taking care of Murry’s Moose!


The third hunt proved to be disappointing. With our new friends Jeff and son James Rice from Corvallis Oregon and their friend and non hunter Ken Munsen from Texas. On this hunt we saw five bulls throughout the eight days. But with one small bull passed up and four cases of extremely bad luck, despite all our best efforts no moose were harvested on this hunt. I guess unfortunately this comes back to the old saying that’s why it is called hunting and not killing. We still had a lot of fun shooting grouse along the way, and made some great friends that we hope to have joined us again for another try. Our fourth hunt found us once again with friend Doug Hoselton, this time accompanied with his granddaughter Sarah Lee. This hunt started off a little rough with Brad’s pickup truck breaking down on the way to meet Doug and Sarah in Quesnel. With one quick pit stop at the Chevrolet dealer to drop Brads truck off to get fixed I met up with my truck and we were back on route. After an always fantastic lunch prepared by Lori we filled out tags and licenses, then set off for a quick afternoon hunt. It didn’t take long and Sarah Lee was lined up on her first muley buck. A shot rang out and the handsome boy was hit well. We tracked him in the snow until nightfall. However we decided to wait until morning to recover Sarah’s trophy. The anticipation to retrieve Sarah’s trophy spilled through the night and into the morning. We finished a fabulous breakfast of French toast and accompanied now by Brad and Doug, all four of us set out in search of Sarah’s deer. We arrived to the spot that we had tracked as far as the previous evening; we were greeted to the unwanted sound of wolves howling in the general direction the wounded buck was heading. You could almost see Sarah’s heart sink as she was thinking the same thing as the rest of us: Did those damn wolves get her buck… We continued our search, slowly and surely after the deer. It took 2 1\2 hours to catch up and after one finishing shot Sarah Lee harvested her first buck, a gorgeous three point. The next five days we hit the pavement hard in search of a moose. We saw sign throughout the days but were yet to cross paths with a bull. On the sixth day of the hunt lady luck gave us our break. Brad and Doug headed to a little higher elevation to hopefully cross paths with moose coming down to lower elevations due to the increasing snow pack and cold temperatures. Brad made a genius decision. Not 2 km into the area and boom there were 4 bulls in one group. The moose saw Brad and Doug at the same time and started running across the logging slash to the safety of the creek bottom below. They piled out of the rig and Brad blared out a cow call, stopping all four bulls in their tracks. Doug asks “Which one should I take?” Brad replies “Whichever one you want” Doug pulls up greeny and lets one rip. 200 yards off hand, Brad doesn’t even have to ask which one Doug was aiming for, as the largest of the four bull’s head drops, followed by the rest of the body. No question Doug and greeny make a good team. Congratulations on your well deserved huge Bull Moose Doug!
Our last hunt was the most disappointing. We had two new friends Dr. Don Jenkins from Vancouver Island B.C. and Mike Callick from Washington join us for trophy Mule Deer in the rut. Everything was absolutely perfect; other than a couple of days of annoying wind, the weather for this adventure was nothing short of story book for a memorable hunt. Throughout the ten day hunt we saw plenty of deer. Does and small bucks were quite abundant however finding the trophy that we were in search of proved to be impossible. Both hunters went home with un-punched tags, but loads of stories of a fantastic experience. Both the clients on this trip were extremely knowledgeable and quality human beings. Although we were unsuccessful in our attempt at the toad buck we were all dreaming of, the things I learned from both individuals was a trophy in its own regard! It never fails, the following week both Brad and I saw two separate shooter bucks, a day late and a dollar short.
Well we hope that this year’s report brought back memories for some, and anticipation for others dreaming of their next experience with the Cariboo Mountain Outfitter’s family. May 2010 bring you straight shooting and good luck for all! We look forward to seeing you all again. We will be attending the following Sportsmen shows, Washington Sportsmen show in Puyallup Washington, Jan 27-31. Eugene boat and sportsman show in Eugene Oregon, Feb 5-7. And the Pacific Northwest Sportsmen Show in Portland Oregon, Feb 10-14 2010. Remember to visit our website Cariboomountainoutfitters.com for updates on the activities around the lodge, more photos from this year’s adventures, and dates of the sportsmans shows that we will be attending. On behalf of the Bowden family we thank you for the great year and look forward to seeing you all again.

Cariboo Mountain Outfitters! Your premier outdoor adventure destination!
Special Thanks to our Guide, Josh Bowski, for doing a bang-up job on this Season's Newsletter!!!